For the most part, I like this set. I had a fond time with M14 but Theros blows that out of the water. Not only is it more flavorful, there is no best color (I prefer Black for what it's worth), and the different mechanics make it so you don't always face the same decks round after round (Blue mirrors in M14). I do have one problem with Theros though, and that would be Heroic.

It's not a particularly bad mechanic by itself, but it sometimes leads to players attempting to assemble Voltron and just not playing very fun games of Magic. Favored Hoplite is probably the worst offender since it just turns any block into a chump block no matter what. Normally trying to assemble Voltron isn't that punishing, there is usually a healthy amount of removal that can deal with it if it starts to get out of hand. In Theros, the early removal is very situational and not always going to be in the maindeck (Last Breath, Pharika's Cure, Spark Jolt), and the white Heroic decks always have a God's Willing to counter said removal. In blue, you can always just bounce the creature if God's Willing isn't there, and it's probably the best way to deal with Heroic since after two Heroic triggers most removal spells are useless outside of Sip of Hemlock, Elspeth -3, and the monstrosity trigger on both Gorgons. Another problem Heroic creates is how favorably it plays with Bestow. Assuming you expend more than 2 cards to kill a Heroic creature that has been bestowed, now you have to deal with the creatures it left behind, and if you wasted a lot to kill the huge creature, you might not have enough cards to deal with the smaller ones. Of course, Heroic isn't all just upside. If you draw all the creatures but none of the enablers, you're left playing with 2/2s and 1/1s that don't really do a whole lot. Conversely, if you put a lot of enablers but just draw the enablers or draw none of your Heroic creatures, you're not gonna do well when your opponent resolves Nessian Asp and Ill-Tempered Cyclops. But if I had to give my biggest gripe about Heroic, is that the flavor isn't there. What exactly is heroic about bestowing a Hopeful Eidolon and putting a Dragon Mantle on it? How is that in any way a heroic thing? A heroic thing should be something awesome, like killing a monster or something, not putting a bunch of enchantments on a creature. That's just my take on it anyway.

This isn't to say I hate Heroic 100%, it gives the white and red decks ways to stand up to the monstrosity creatures, but you're never building them up to defend since you can always be the aggressor with those creatures. It can let you win races with just one creature that you wouldn't have been able to win otherwise. It makes your random enchantments better, and it gives your bestow creatures something to bestow.

So why the talk about Heroic? Well, I didn't plan on it, but it's the main feature of my Sealed and Draft matches, so I felt it was worth touching on. With that said, let's crack some packs!

Deckbuilding

Round 1

Round 2

Round 3

Round 4

Draft

Round 1

Conclusion

Heroic can do some pretty nutty things, and Wing-Steed Rider is a pretty good Magic card. Like I said, I'm not a big fan of Heroic, it can lead to a lot of blowouts, especially when you can't really play around the tricks if they make an obvious bad attack. It's definitely the one deck I'd rather not face as it asks the question: "Can you kill my creature?" because if you can't, you're done. What do you guys think about Heroic? Am I just being down on it because I'm losing to it, or do I make valid points? As always, if you have any comments, questions, or concern, leave them down below. Next week we'll be back doing the same thing, with possibly some Two-Ticket Tuesday!